The 29-year-old announced last month that he was hanging up his boots after failing to overcome neck and knee injuries.

Flanker Warburton, who led the Lions on successful tours to Australia in 2013 and New Zealand last summer, had not played since the drawn third All Blacks Test 12 months ago and could not regain his fitness during pre-season training with Cardiff Blues.

“I remember saying to the physio, ‘I’m fine but when I tackle or run, that’s when I get pain,'” Warburton told the Times. “He was like, ‘That is a bit of a problem doing what you do.’ ”

“When I was doing overhead press in the gym, I was still getting nervy symptoms, pain in my neck, and I hadn’t even done any contact work. After a week I was coming home from training and I was having joint pain – you can deal with muscle soreness but this was different.

“I didn’t want to be that player who was just hanging on, holding a pad. If I couldn’t get to the heights I wanted to, I’d rather just call it a day.

“If I couldn’t get to an international standard, I was not going to do it and I could tell I wasn’t going to make that after about a week’s training. My body just couldn’t cope with the volume of running anymore.”

Warburton captained the Lions on successful tours in 2013 and 2017.

Warburton admits that next year’s World Cup in Japan made his decision to quit more difficult.

“We finished our session and we were in a huddle. Some of the senior players and coaches were talking and I remember not being as focused as I should have been, looking at the grass,” he added.

“I was just thinking, ‘This is it. I have found that session so hard, what with all the changing of direction. My knees are so sore’. I just thought, ‘I am never going to get through 14 months to get to the World Cup’.”

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Clubs

Chris Ashton has received a seven-week suspension for his tip-tackle on Rory Kockott during Sale’s pre-season friendly win at Castres last Friday.

Ashton did not accept the charge but an independent disciplinary hearing found him guilty and issued a sanction that mean will miss England’s next training camp in Bristol and the first six games of the Sharks’ Gallagher Premiership season.

“It is an important principle of rugby regulation to prevent injury to others,” panel chair Richard Whittam said.

“Provocation is not a defence to foul play and lifting a player and dropping that player such that his head makes contact with the ground has the potential to cause serious injury.”